But it’s up to the provinces and licensed producers to decide how they’ll specifically adhere to those regulations.

LICENSED PRODUCERS SAY FINDING PROPER PACKAGING PROVING DIFFICULT

Getting packaging that fits those requirement has been no easy feat for licensed producers, according to Edwin Jewell.

He’s the president and CEO of Canada’s Island Garden in Charlottetown, which supplies cannabis to PEI and Nova Scotia.

Edwin Jewell, the president and CEO of Canada’s Island Garden in Charlottetown, says getting the right packaging has been a challenge. (John Robertson/CBC)

“For our company right now, getting the appropriate packaging here on time and the labels to go with it has been the major challenge our company has had over the last two months,” he said.

“This part of the industry is extremely new. We’ve literally only been at a few days,” Jewell said.

Jewell says licensed cannabis sellers are also being asked to adhere to safety regulations that alcohol producers aren’t.

“If you take into the fact that it has to be child proof, and you compare that to a bottle of hard liquor that you could buy at any province in Canada, any kid could screw the cap off a bottle of hard liquor,” he said.

“The standards for us are set higher than that. We have to have child proof caps, it’s bulky, it adds cost, and adds packaging, but to Health Canada’s point, they’re trying to set the bar fairly high at the start to make sure things go well, and I understand that,” he said.

In the future, Jewell says he believe his and other companies will be looking at how to reduce packaging.

“There’s no questions we’ll do better going forward, but you have to start somewhere.”